Sermon for Sunday, 19th September 2010 (16th Sunday after Trinity/Proper 20)
“Oh, that my head were a spring of water and my eyes a fountain of tears!” Jeremiah 9: 1
I don’t remember sermons very often, I would be hard pressed to tell you what I said myself last Sunday, but I remember sermons I heard in course I did in Bristol. I still remember the sermon I heard during the first week I was there six years ago.
On Wednesday evenings the college gathered for Holy Communion and the preacher on that first week I was there was the vice-principal. Drawing on the Bible story of Jesus reaching down to grab hand of Peter, who was sinking in the water, he preached a moving sermon about the death of his father and about his own emotions. He admitted feeling a sense of anger at the graveside. He could not remember his father, who had reached the grand age of 92, ever giving him a hug in his entire life. It was a sermon about depth of feeling, about deeply felt emotions, about grabbing firmly the hand of God. We all agreed with him. But, of course, I suspect few of us changed the way we were.
We don’t express emotions, it’s not in our culture. We might get worked up about a rugby match or a soccer match, but when it comes to our relationships with people, we maintain a calm reserve. Before I moved from the North I was in a parish where I would have had 20-30 funerals a year and, like everyone else, I would have shaken hands and said, “Sorry for your trouble”. We don’t go in for expressing ourselves in the way that people do in some other countries, it’s just not us.
But when we turn to Scripture, we are confronted with Jeremiah. Jeremiah would have made the most plain-talking Ulster Presbyterian look reserved. Jeremiah takes on reality head on, the are no mealy-mouthed words, no avoiding the harsh realities of the situation. But look at how Jeremiah rebukes himself for not being more emotional. “Oh, that my head were a spring of water and my eyes a fountain of tears!” The prophet complains at his lack of emotion in the face of all that has happened. He realises that things important to God should draw deeply held feelings from us. Jeremiah does not regard being quietly reserved as appropriate when it comes to the things of God.
God is a God who expresses emotions. Read through the Bible for yourselves and the one thing that God doesn’t do is sit there and say nothing, God never speaks in bland platitudes. Read Jeremiah, read the prophet Hosea, read the Gospels. When his friend Lazarus dies, we are told in St John’s Gospel that Jesus weeps. When Jesus looks down on the city of Jerusalem, St Luke tells us that Jesus expresses his grief at the stubbornness and hard-heartedness of the people, ‘Oh Jerusalem, Jerusalem’; read the verses and you can hear the pain in his voice. Sometimes I think that Jesus would have been regarded as far too emotional to have mad an Anglican bishop.
Expressing emotion in our culture is often seen as a sign of weakness, yet emotion is an expression of how important things are to us. How can we express huge emotions at soccer or rugby matches, but when it comes to the real things, to the things of life and the things of death, then say nothing?
I would love an explanation as to why the most deeply felt thoughts and feelings don’t bring out a greater response in us.
We tend to be silent in our private lives and we tend to be silent in our faith. I wonder sometimes if there is anything that would stir us into action. We live in a world where people seem to think it’s OK to treat Christians and Christianity like a doormat, where even simple things like respect for God’s name no longer exist.
Why are people allowed to constantly profane God’s name on RTE television ad radio? Why do people think it is acceptable to say ‘Oh, my God’ as an ordinary, everyday exclamation? Can you imagine the outcry if the name of Allah or Mohammed were used in the way that God’s name is used on the radio? Can you imagine Moslems putting up with the treatment that Christians get?
We say nothing. We seem afraid to express our emotions. Perhaps it’s because we are reserved, or perhaps it’s because we don’t believe things very strongly. Jeremiah realises that there are situations that demand a deep response, that if we are serious about something, then tears may be the only response we can make.
God was looking for a change of heart among his people in those days of Jeremiah, God looks for a change of heart amongst us today. He looks for people who take him seriously; people who try to live their lives in a different way; people who realise that there are responsibilities in life as well as rights.
I remember listening to that sermon in Bristol and agreeing with what was said, and when I got to the chapel door I just very reservedly shook hands and said “thank you”. When it came to applying what he said in my own life, I did nothing.
I think we all do that, hearing something is OK, doing something about it is a different matter. ‘Oh, that my head were a spring of water and my eyes a fountain of tears!’, prays Jeremiah and I think we need to share in that prayer, we need to pray for a faith that stirs up deep emotions.
If we don’t feel deeply – if we think it’s all right to sit lightly to the things of God; if we think it’s all right to be detached in what we believe; if we think that things shouldn’t be taken too seriously, then we need to ask ourselves a question, if my faith doesn’t matter enough to get worked up about, then does it matter at all? Either God is everything or he is nothing.
‘Oh, that my head were a spring of water and my eyes a fountain of tears!’
Hello Ian!
Sorry, this comment has nothing to do with your sermon. Just stopped by to let you know that I was thinking of you over the weekend. Garrison Keillor had his annual meatloaf dinner and street dance after his broadcast and it’s always a fun event to attend with my granddaughter. Two years ago, she took second place in his loon calling contest and got a $50 prize. She said once was enough, so didn’t enter this year. Anyway . . . . I’m not trying to steal your thread. Just wanted to let you know that you came to mind as we attended. I should have asked you if you wanted a PHC shirt or something, but I didn’t plan ahead. The event is usually in October and was earlier this year. Hope all is well and that you’ve found a comfortable routine with your new assignment.
Gram
Hi Gram,
Keillor still cheers me up on a regular basis. Wobegon is not so different from where I now work.
Good to read you and Goodnight are doing well. Hope the fall is mild; the weather in France has been beautiful in the 70s and sunshine. We go back to Irish rain on Friday.
Ian,
I wondered if your new assignment wasn’t a bit like Wobegone. Glad to hear all is well. So far, our fall is mild and beautiful. I’m putting off turning on the furnace as long as possible.
I’m heading to the hospital at the end of the month. Don’t shoot me, but when they ask me my religion upon admission, I always tell them I am a ‘none.’ Worrying about some old catholic cleric coming in when I’m doped up on morphine would make me sicker than what I’m going in for. I am generally sanguine, but the abuse scandal has left it’s impact. I’m not convinced it really matters whether someone comes in and throws holy water on me before I go to surgery anyway. What say you?
I have developed a philosophy of trying to cause least harm. I have no belief in holy water or prayers to saints or the like, but they are not actually harmful, so if someone near me was into such stuff and would be hurt if it were rejected, I would probably let them go ahead.